Nest of Vipers Read Online Free

bad with names.'
    The child was startled at being spoken to. 'I'm Lepida,' she whispered.
    'Lepida, of course you are, and how pretty you look today.'
    The child was pleased by the compliment and yet confused by it. This mysterious woman wasn't even looking at her.
    Apicata beckoned Lepida to move closer. 'Do you remember who I am?'
    Lepida knew she had never met this woman before, yet she had the presence of mind to offer an answer. 'You are the mother of the bride.'
    'Yes, I am,' said Apicata. 'My daughter is marrying into the family of the Emperor. That is why we're all here.'
    Lepida didn't need this to be explained to her. 'I love weddings. You must be very happy.'
    Apicata nodded. 'I am also the wife of Praetorian Prefect Sejanus. My husband has a very special job. He exposes traitors for the Emperor.'
    Without understanding why, the child felt fear.
    'You mustn't tremble,' Apicata said. 'You are an innocent child. You know nothing of such things.'
    Lepida was silent, staring into the eyes of this woman who seemed to see her and yet did not.
    'Do you notice, over there,' Apicata whispered, 'just a little distance away in that quiet corner of the garden, there is a woman talking to a very strange man. Do you see them?'
    Lepida saw.
    'Who is the lady?'
    Lepida bit her lip.
    'Who is the lady?'
    The child said nothing.
    Apicata placed her fingers on Lepida's bare arm. Despite the warmth of the spring sun, her fingers were cold. 'Who is the lady, child? You know her, don't you?'
    'She is Aemilia, my mother . . .' The girl pulled her arm away. 'She isn't a traitor. She has done nothing wrong.'
    'Of course she hasn't,' said Apicata. 'I am merely asking, that's all. I recognised her but couldn't place her.'
    'You want people to think you can see them, but you can't. You can't see anything.' Lepida ran away from Apicata's reach.
    'It's true, child,' Apicata whispered after her, amused. 'But I can hear like the wolves themselves.'
    She turned her head to the hushed conversation again, to the treasonous, reckless words between the child's noble mother, Aemilia of the Aemilii, and Thrasyllus, the last soothsayer in Rome. The old and broken man was barely lucid, slumped in the dirt while the embarrassed guests ignored him as they would an epileptic. Apicata couldn't imagine why the Emperor Tiberius had permitted his seer to attend the wedding – if he was even aware he had. Perhaps the old man had wandered in, having escaped from wherever it was that Tiberius kept him locked away? No one but Apicata knew who the soothsayer actually was, but clearly Aemilia had chanced an accurate guess.
    Although the noble mother was making it seem to those who might be watching her that she wasn't talking to this soiled, unpleasant man, to Apicata, who could only listen, it was obvious what Aemilia was doing. The noble woman sought answers about the future – answers about her children, about her house. The words the soothsayer was saying meant nothing to Apicata, but it hardly mattered. In daring to ask at all, Aemilia had placed the point of Apicata's sword neatly at her own ribs. Apicata would bide her time before letting the woman know of it.
    The Praetorian Prefect's blind wife believed no one else witnessed this scene, but she was wrong. I, Iphicles, the lowly slave, saw it too, from where I was shepherding my young dominus , Little Boots, towards the banquet. The soothsayer spoke as if from a thousand miles away: ' The third is hooked by a harpy's look; the rarest of all birds . . .'
    His words meant nothing to me either, but I took note of them all the same.
    The doors to the banquet hall opened and the dining slaves announced the commencement of the wedding feast. Apicata arose and waited for someone to guide her in. As she stood there, smiling pleasantly, she wished she could reassure the girl Lepida that whatever she might fear, her mother would not be exposed as a traitor. It would be a needless waste. Apicata had already gathered